On April 11, the Association released the march china passenger car sales data.
Retail sales in the passenger car market reached 1.579 million units in March 2022, down 10.5% year-on-year and 25.6% month-on-month. From January to March, the cumulative retail sales were 4.915 million units, down 4.5% year-on-year and 230,000 units year-on-year, and the overall trend was lower than expected.
In March, the wholesale sales of manufacturers were 1.814 million units, down 1.6% year-on-year and 23.6% month-on-month, and the performance of some car companies was differentiated due to production constraints. From January to March, wholesale sales reached 5.439 million units, up 8.3% year-on-year, achieving a real start. Although due to the impact of the epidemic in March, the trend pressure this year is great, but due to the demand for replenishment and the strong sales of new energy, the cumulative wholesale growth rate from January to March is 8.3% under the comprehensive influence, which is stronger.
New Energy: Wholesale sales of new energy passenger vehicles reached 455,000 units in March, up 122.4% year-on-year and 43.6% month-on-month, close to the previous year. From January to March, the wholesale number of new energy passenger vehicles was 1.190 million units, an increase of 145.4% year-on-year. Retail sales of new energy passenger cars reached 445,000 units in March, up 137.6% year-on-year and 63.1% month-on-month, both better than the march trend of the calendar year. From January to March, domestic retail sales of new energy passenger cars were 1.070 million units, up 146.6% year-on-year.
The trend of new energy vehicles and traditional fuel vehicles in March has a certain contrast, and the purchase of production materials in March drives the demand for traditional car exchange, releasing the popularity of automobiles and upgrading consumption; the strong growth of new energy vehicles in the spring influenza season, the safe travel of the second car of the family is of great significance, echoing the further recognition and adaptation of urban residents to new energy models in short-distance travel.
In terms of the new energy vehicle market, affected by the price increase, the order performance before the price increase is hot, and the overall order is sufficient. Overall, although the domestic epidemic still has local sporadic cases, especially in megacities such as Shenzhen and Shanghai, the relatively mild epidemic prevention measures in most areas at that time had no obvious impact on residents' travel and car purchase consumption, which promoted the sales of new energy vehicles.
Wholesale: The wholesale penetration rate of new energy vehicle manufacturers in March was 25.1%, an increase of 14 percentage points from the 11.1% penetration rate in March 2021. In March, the penetration rate of new energy vehicles of independent brands was 41%; the penetration rate of new energy vehicles in luxury vehicles was 34%,, while the penetration rate of new energy vehicles of mainstream joint venture brands was only 3%. In March, the wholesale sales of pure electric vehicles were 371,000 units, an increase of 116.8% year-on-year; plug-in hybrid sales were 84,000 units, an increase of 151.3% year-on-year, which to a certain extent verified the market prediction of some manufacturers that "plug-in hybrid is the first step in the transformation of oil vehicle potential customers". In March, the electric vehicle A00 model grew the strongest year-on-month compared with February, and the growth rate of models from small to large gradually decreased. The dumbbell structure of the pure electric market has improved, of which A00-class wholesale sales of 119,000 units, an increase of 75% month-on-month, accounting for 32% of pure electric vehicles; A0-class wholesale sales of 55,000 vehicles, accounting for 15% of pure electric vehicles; A-class electric vehicles accounted for 22% of pure electric vehicles; B-class electric vehicles reached 113,000 units, an increase of 32% month-on-month, accounting for 30% of pure electric shares.
Retail: The domestic retail penetration rate of new energy vehicles in March was 28.2%, an increase of 17.6 percentage points from the penetration rate of 10.6% in March 2021. In March, the penetration rate of new energy vehicles in independent brands was 46% and that of new energy vehicles in luxury vehicles was 32%, while the penetration rate of new energy vehicles in mainstream joint venture brands was only 4.3%.
Exports: 11,000 new energy vehicles were exported in March, due to factors at the end of the quarter, Tesla China exported 60 vehicles, down 33,000 units from the previous month, SAIC Motor passenger car exports of 4658 new energy vehicles, Dongfeng EasyJet exported 2532 vehicles, BYD 1109 vehicles, 1046 DPCA, other car companies new energy vehicles mainly in the domestic market.
Car companies: In March, the new energy passenger car market diversified, BYD pure electric and plug-and-mix dual drive to consolidate the leading position of its own brand new energy; the traditional car companies represented by the SAIC Group and the GAC Group performed relatively prominently in the new energy sector. There are 13 enterprises with wholesale sales exceeding 10,000 (an increase of 2 over the same period last year), including: BYD 104338, Tesla China 65,814, SAIC-GM-Wuling 51,157, Chery Automobile 21,817, GAC Aian 20,317, Changan Automobile 15,624, Xiaopeng Automobile 15,414, Great Wall Motor 15,057, Geely Automobile 14,166, Nezha Car 12,026, Ideal Car 11,034, and SAIC Passenger Car 10,880 , 10,059 zero-run cars.
New forces: In March, Xiaopeng, Ideal, Nezha, Zero Run, Weilai, Weima and other new forces car companies sold better than the same period last year and month on month, especially the price increases of Xiaopeng, Ideal and Nezha had little impact, and the month-on-month growth was very good. Among the mainstream joint venture brands, North and South Volkswagen's new energy vehicles were wholesaled to 12,709 units, accounting for 63% of the mainstream joint venture, and Volkswagen's firm electrification transformation strategy has achieved initial results. Other joint ventures and luxury brands are still waiting to be strengthened.
The Federation of Automobiles said that since the beginning of this year, due to the price increase of raw materials such as lithium and nickel, the speed of the price increase of power batteries has greatly exceeded the expectations of the industry, so the pressure on car companies after the price increase of power batteries is very large, and the cost pressure can only be alleviated by price increases.
The impact of the current two rounds of new energy vehicle price increases is not obvious for the time being. The first is the sales model of new energy vehicles is order sales, and at present, there are more orders before the price increase in the hands of various car companies, resulting in the basic digestion of pre-orders in March and April, so the sales impact is not large.
Secondly, the new energy plug-in mix diverts the fuel vehicle market, and the high oil price leads to the increase in the advantages of new energy. Now in the case of high oil prices, the cost performance of new energy vehicles has been significantly improved, but the traditional car market is more difficult.
The third reason is that the rigid demand of consumers of new energy vehicles is strong and the price sensitivity is relatively low, so small price changes will not significantly affect consumer demand for new energy vehicles.
The fourth reason is that the order price lock before the price increase of new energy vehicles is locked, forming the result of the lock price of early booking, which triggers a new situation of more consumer rationality or follow the trend. Car companies have also taken measures to regulate orders for suspected scalpers.
The core mode of regulation of supply and demand of automobile consumption is price. The relative flexibility of production and sales in the traditional fuel vehicle market is a huge advantage. The shortage of chips in the early stage did not show a sharp price increase in traditional fuel vehicles, but through the super price adjustment ability of channel dealers, the demand stability under cost and supply changes was achieved. New energy vehicles have continued to be popular in the past two years, and channel model innovation needs to be improved.